


The Perfect Moment

by Mizmak



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Aziraphale Loves Crowley (Good Omens), Crowley Loves Aziraphale (Good Omens), Declarations Of Love, First Kiss, Happy Ending, Idiots in Love, Kissing, M/M, Moving In Together, Romance, Sleeping Together
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-24
Updated: 2020-01-24
Packaged: 2021-02-27 06:35:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,310
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22392631
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mizmak/pseuds/Mizmak
Summary: Aziraphale had often daydreamed about the perfect situation and the perfect moment to declare his love for Crowley...would it play out in reality the way he always wanted?
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 12
Kudos: 122





	The Perfect Moment

_Raining again_.

Aziraphale sat at his desk in the bookshop, idly tapping his fingers on the worn top. He glanced out the window for the tenth time in as many minutes, but all he saw was the same rain, the same streaky windows, the same crowd of humans scurrying past with umbrellas.

Four days in a row now. 

One of the scurrying humans turned out not to be human. 

The bookshop was closed and the door was locked, which naturally didn’t stop Crowley from entering. He looked drenched through to the skin, no umbrella in hand.

“Bloody rain.” He snapped his fingers and was instantly dry. 

“Have a cup of cocoa with me?” Aziraphale rose and went to the small kitchen area to set a saucepan of milk on the stove.

Crowley sauntered over and collapsed onto the sofa, limbs sprawled every which way. “That was just from the car to your door. When is it going to _stop?”_

“The forecast claims it should end late tomorrow.” 

“Urrghh. Feel like a caged animal. Need to stretch my legs. Or get on the road and drive fast somewhere for no reason. Not going to do that in this blasted weather – too many idiots out there.”

“Yes, well, come and keep me company here. Anytime.”

The milk in the saucepan soon boiled and he poured it out into two mugs into which he’d put cocoa and sugar. He stirred them up and brought them over.

“Move your legs, please.” 

Crowley obliged, and took the proffered mug as Aziraphale sat down beside him. “Mmm. Perfect.”

Aziraphale let out a sigh. _Yes. Nearly perfect_. “Do you want to go out to dinner later?”

“The Ritz all right?”

“Of course. My – _our_ – favorite place.” 

Several weeks had passed since they had averted Armageddon, and had been freed from Heaven and Hell’s oversight. They had settled into a fairly comfortable routine of dining together, strolling through St. James’s Park together, or simply spending time at the bookshop with a drink or two, the occasional talk, or in companionable silence.

Routine, perhaps, but after all that they had been through over six millennia, this quiet respite was quite extraordinary. 

They’d finally been given their freedom. 

Aziraphale sipped at the soothing cocoa. They’d been given a chance to be together as he had often dreamt – an angel and a demon who were the best and dearest of friends – and who happened to love each other.

Daydreams, sometimes night dreams – he liked to play scenarios over in his mind, little fantasies in which he declared his love for Crowley. 

Though he hadn’t turned any of those dreams into reality yet.

It wasn’t that he worried over Crowley’s response to such a declaration. He certainly didn’t worry that he wasn’t capable of such love in return.

True, demons were not meant to be creatures of love, but Crowley was _different_.

Yes, he had _tried_ to be demonic, in his own generally incompetent fashion. But Aziraphale had always sensed the tenderness buried within – and sometimes, not so buried. 

Yes, he sowed temptations left and right, but the humans didn’t have to act on them. They had free will. And while he had plenty of opportunities to aid and abet humans of great evil, he steered clear of them, letting people’s own crimes speak for themselves.

Aziraphale saw the tenderness deep down. Crowley never meant to Fall. There he had dwelled, though, answering to the forces he did not owe allegiance to, living the only way that he could – as a demon in name, a fallen angel by happenstance, and as a soul that Hell tried to claim as its own without profit.

For they had never truly _owned_ him.

No, he was not worried. Crowley had saved him so many times at great risk, and in the end, had wanted Aziraphale to escape to the stars with him. No doubts there. 

So what was he waiting for, other than the perfect moment?

Aziraphale had played over the scenarios in many daydreams, but a rainy afternoon on the sofa hadn’t figured in one of them yet. Something closer – something even more intimate – that was when it would happen. 

His favorite of all those fantasies, where he carefully led Crowley into a more physical expression of their affection, had not yet happened, but it would. Someday. 

It had to be perfect.

_Soon_ , he thought. 

Perhaps when the rain stopped.

“We’re taking a walk,” Crowley announced two days later when he strolled into the bookshop. The rains had finally let up.

Aziraphale looked out the windows, up at a lovely clear blue sky. “Ah.” A summer sky, a warm sky -- a sky for walking by grass and trees and ponds. 

“Come on, Angel.” Crowley was already heading for the door.

Aziraphale took up his coat and followed.

The bookshop was a twenty-minute walk to St. James’ Park, during which they didn’t talk due to the noise of the people and traffic. Once inside the park, though, they slowed their pace and ambled along the path towards the Blue Bridge.

“I needed to get out,” Aziraphale said as they strolled. “Thank you.”

“We shouldn’t waste sunny days.” Crowley stopped at a midpoint along the bridge to lean against the railing.

“No, indeed not.” Aziraphale stood close beside him. “Sometimes I wonder why we wound up in such a damp country. We could live anywhere.” Though after all this time, he couldn’t imagine going anywhere else. He adored London – well, he adored the whole country.

“You don’t know?” Crowley asked. “ _I_ only stayed here because _you_ kept coming back here.”

Aziraphale stared at him. “You _what?_ But my dear fellow, I only came back because _you_ were here!”

Crowley made a half-guffaw, half-spluttering noise. “ _Don’t_ tell me that now, after all these centuries!”

“But – but you weren’t following me around – I was following you around ---“ Well, at least, he _thought_ that was how it had been. “How did we manage to not figure that out?”

Even behind the sunglasses, he could see Crowley roll his eyes. “Because we’re incompetent idiots, that’s why.”

Aziraphale laughed. “I suppose we must be.”

Crowley shook his head. “They should have fired us both ages ago.”

“Yes, well, they probably would have got round to it if we hadn’t managed to become unemployed on our own.”

“Bureaucracies move very, very slowly.” Crowley looked down at the ducks paddling about on the lake. “Makes you wonder how they ever get _anything_ done.”

“Probably better off leaving everything alone.” Aziraphale was glad that at least _they_ were being left alone.

They walked on then, across the bridge and along a path that wound alongside the lake towards its western end, towards Buckingham Palace. 

“I do like London,” Aziraphale said. “So much culture, so much history…so many good restaurants.”

“And one excellent bookshop.”

“Yes.” Aziraphale couldn’t imagine life without his bookshop, and felt a brief shudder at the thought of it burning down. Thank goodness he hadn’t witnessed that horror, and thank goodness it had been miraculously restored. “I feel at home here.”

The sun warmed him as he walked, on this glorious summer day. He felt at home…with his books, with this beautiful park, with Crowley by his side. 

Who had not responded to his last remark.

Would _this_ be the perfect moment? 

In Aziraphale’s favorite daydream though, the one where he declared his love, they weren’t walking in the park. They were sharing his bed – it was a special dream in which he watched Crowley as he slept, lying in close repose…until his dear friend stirred, awoke, and allowed Aziraphale to whisper those three special words to him. 

Of course, to _get_ to that point, he would need to have Crowley staying at the bookshop – all the time.

“Crowley….”

“Mm?”

“ _Do_ you feel at home here? You must do.” He paused. “Even if it _is_ a bit damp at times.”

“Didn’t I say that I wanted to live wherever you were living?”

“That’s not quite what I was asking.” What did Crowley consider home – or rather, what did he consider _a_ home – not his flat, surely. It was cold, sleek, modern. Mostly cold.

Not a place to _live_ in. Though nowadays, he mostly seemed to be in the bookshop. 

Crowley had gone awfully quiet.

“My dear –“ Why hadn’t he thought of asking this earlier? Aziraphale inwardly chastised himself for being obtuse. “Crowley, if you want to move – that is, I think you _should_ move out of that wretched flat.” He stopped walking and turned to face his friend. “Stop going back there every night. Please. Stay at the bookshop.” 

“But I – what about – er, I mean, really?” 

Aziraphale tried hard to read his expression behind the sunglasses. Consternation? Confusion? Hopefulness – oh, botheration. “Yes, really. I want you to live there.” How much plainer could he be?

“Er…I…uh…um –“ Crowley was the past master of the stammer.

“The word you are searching for is ‘yes’.”

“It is? Oh. Right.” Crowley sighed, looked down at his feet for a second. Then he raised his head and with one swift move, took off the sunglasses.

His eyes were shiny – they were _smiling_ , and they were shining. Aziraphale took his hand. “Really?”

Crowley took one step forward in their close stance, nearly touching chest to chest, and placed a light kiss on Aziraphale’s forehead. “Yes,” he said as he stepped back.

_Well, I’ll be damned_.

It took a few days – the rain came back, for one thing, and movers were engaged for the large houseplants, but eventually the rains stopped again and everything was delivered to the bookshop.

Crowley had carefully arranged each plant near a window. He left all of his furniture behind, bringing only the art – his souvenirs, as he called them.

“That statue is not going to fit in,” Aziraphale said when Crowley rolled in the large sculpture of the demon wrestling an angel – and winning.

“You don’t like it?” Crowley had a definite twinkle in his eyes.

“It’s too… _big_.” What he wanted to say was “too presumptuous” but he figured Crowley would know what he thought of it well enough.

“Right. _Big_.” With an irritating sneer, Crowley snapped his fingers. The statue shrank down until it was only a foot high. “Does it fit _now?”_

Aziraphale rolled his eyes. “Well, if you _must_ have it, put it somewhere I’ll never have to see it.” He gazed around the bookshelves. “Over there, by the Jeffrey Archer books.” He’d only ever stocked popular novels to give customers something to buy so they wouldn’t purchase the books he actually cared about.

Crowley picked up the diminished statue and took it to the shelf in question, shoving it into a gap between the books. “That’s good. Now, then, what about the lectern?”

“Ah. Also too big. However, I like that piece.” The statue stood in the center of the shop, taking up far too much room. It was a lectern with an eagle’s head, and stone wings outstretched – and it came from the church that Crowley had bombed during the Blitz, to save a certain angel.

One of his _souvenirs_. 

“I can make it smaller,” Crowley said.

“Not that much smaller – perhaps half its current size? I think it might fit well over by the history section.”

“Got it.” Crowley reduced the lectern to one-half its size and set about positioning it by the history bookcases.

“I’ve wondered about it,” Aziraphale said as he directed Crowley’s efforts. “That is, I wonder why you took something so large. And from a _church_. I mean, I assume you wanted a souvenir of coming to my rescue once again, but it’s from a _church_ , of all things. No, no – a little more to your left.”

Crowley finally got it set where he wanted it. He rubbed dust from his hands. “Yeah, well, once the place got bombed, it wasn’t consecrated anymore. And this stood out – and it has _wings_.”

“Yes – bird wings. Not angel wings.”

“Still reminds me of you – when I looked up after the bomb exploded, you were standing there, and this was behind you, and its wings spread out behind you in just the right way. Sort of protective. You were _safe_.”

Only because Crowley had saved him. “That was your doing. I never got to thank you properly either, any of the times you rescued me.” It couldn’t be allowed then, before they were free. “I am eternally grateful.”

“Yeah, yeah. Don’t get soppy, or I’ll regret moving in here.”

“Nonsense. Who’s the sentimental one? _You_ have the souvenirs, not I.”

Crowley looked over at the framed drawing of the _Mona Lisa_ that he’d hung on the wall. “What – one da Vinci, a few statues – over six thousand _years?_ That’s not much. You’re the one with thousands of books that you don’t want to part with.”

“That’s different. They aren’t mementos. They’re _collectibles_.”

“You’ve read them all?”

Aziraphale frowned. “What’s that got to do with? Yes, I’ve read most of them.”

“And you can’t part with them?”

“Certainly not.”

Crowley had a triumphant expression. “Then it _isn’t_ any different.” He waved a hand at the bookshelves. “These are you _mental_ souvenirs.”

“My what –“ Aziraphale looked around at the books. Mental souvenirs? Oh, dear. Ah. When he looked at each title, he traveled down its pages in his mind, recalling the joys he felt while reading it…mementos of many, many mental journeys. “ _Damn_.”

Crowley sauntered over to give Aziraphale’s shoulder a pat. “There, there. Don’t be too hard on yourself.”

“I’m not. And don’t look so self-satisfied.”

“Hmph. I am merely amused.”

“Then stop being so amused!” Aziraphale gave him a fond look, though, as he said it. “You’re exasperating.”

“Yup. And I’m here to _stay_.” Crowley walked over to the kitchenette, where he dug up a bottle of wine. “Want to celebrate the arrival of your new roommate?”

Exasperating, but only from time to time. “Yes, I do.” 

He went over to sit down on the sofa as Crowley brought over the bottle and two glasses. 

After pouring the wine, Crowley sprawled onto the sofa, facing him, and handed a glass over. He raised his own. “To _home_.”

Aziraphale gladly clinked his glass to Crowley’s.

“To _home_.”

It was so close…the words started to form on his lips, but then Aziraphale bit them back. Not _quite_ perfect. 

For he knew that there was only the one bed here. When night fell, his favorite daydream would surely become reality.

He sat in an armchair next to the bed, watching Crowley sleep.

His upstairs living area had a sitting room with a fireplace and a sofa, a bathroom, and the bedroom with its capacious four-poster bed. 

Though with Crowley sprawled across more than half of it, there didn’t seem to be _quite_ as much space.

How did he manage to be so…so physically _loose?_ He’d been in that body, but he’d definitely had some trouble being as limber and sauntering and loose-limbed as Crowley was – luckily, the demons who took him to Hell tied him up, and afterwards he’d been shackled or otherwise in a position where sprawling wasn’t required. 

And how did he manage being so _thin?_ He did eat – but nowhere near as much as Aziraphale did, mere nibbles to his platefuls. He enjoyed his drink – but even then, he often as not sobered up by getting rid of it again. 

So there he lay on the bed, thin and loose with it, yet somehow looking ever so comfortable, with a faint upward twitch to his lips that made Aziraphale wonder if he were having a particularly pleasant dream.

He had dispensed with the comforter, and had pulled up the thin top sheet halfway. He had donned black silk pyjamas. He seemed to be mostly on his side, partly on his back, one leg bent at the knee, crossed over the other leg, halfway into the other side of the bed. One arm lay across his chest while the other was flung out near his head, lying partly on the other pillow.

_His_ pillow.

And there was that faint smile….

Aziraphale suddenly yawned. He typically slept only four or five hours a night. It was one in the morning. Crowley had been sleeping since eleven. He looked quite content and Aziraphale worried about disturbing his slumber, but he was feeling tired – and slightly nervous.

He had known, naturally, when he’d asked Crowley to move in, that this meant sharing the bed. All part of the plan… Nothing at all had been said about it – all they had discussed so far was where to put his few possessions, whether he preferred morning showers or baths, or evening ones. 

When he’d come up here last night, Crowley simply yawned, looked at the bed, and had said, “Can I have the right side?” And with a yes, that was it. He’d miracled up the pyjamas, slid under the sheet, and had been asleep almost instantly.

And Aziraphale hadn’t even bothered to bring up a book. All he wanted to do was watch his friend sleep, nearly – _nearly_ the same as in his daydreams. He gazed at him in wonder that he was even there, in his bed, looking so at ease.

With his hand on Aziraphale’s pillow.

He stifled another yawn. _So tired…_ Oh, honestly. Go to sleep, then, you idiot, he told himself firmly. Why, now that he was so close to fulfilling his fondest wish, was he trembling? Nothing bad was likely to happen, of that he was certain. They loved each other, after all. He was ready – this was the perfect time. 

Surely it wouldn’t be awkward? There were a million ways to express love, and he didn’t think awkwardness topped the list – perhaps in the very early stages of a relationship, but not after knowing someone for six millennia.

He knew Crowley – knew his casual stride, his nonchalance, and the way he had mastered the affectation of aloofness. Despite that light kiss on the forehead yesterday, Crowley would never make the first move into something more. He had probably inwardly shrugged that kiss off two seconds after – that was his way, moving mercurially from moment to moment.

No, it was up to _him_ to coax his friend into deeper waters.

_Go on. It’s time._

Aziraphale got up and slowly undressed, carefully folding or hanging up each item neatly before slipping into his own pyjamas of beige satin.

Then he very, very slowly and very, very carefully climbed into his side of the bed, trying very, very hard not to disrupt Crowley’s sleep, though there was nothing he could do about that arm – he was going to have to move it if he wanted to use his pillow.

He managed to slip beneath the sheet, and to find enough room to stretch out full length. He very, very gently lifted Crowley’s hand and very, very carefully shifted it over.

“Mmpf.” 

_Damn._

Crowley stirred, mumbled, shifted here and there, then settled down once more, eyes still closed.

_Whew._

Aziraphale lay on his back, now able to put his head down on his own pillow. Everything was _fine_.

Crowley’s bent leg touched him, the knee against his thigh. Aziraphale sighed. It was lovely.

He wanted to lie there a while first, in that quiet repose he had dreamt of for so long. He certainly wasn’t stalling…not at all.

First, he would drift away into a pleasant slumber, side by side with the one he loved – he wanted to dream first, he wanted to feel the way he did when he shuttered the world away and lost himself to the stars. 

Aziraphale knew it would be all right. Their love had been _written_ in those stars. And when he came down to Earth again, it would be all right, too, because their love had been etched in that Earth from the beginning of time.

Crowley lay quietly beside him. Aziraphale closed his eyes and tried to fall asleep, convinced that he couldn’t. His whole body tingled. _Soon_. Sleep first, that’s how the daydream always went. Sleep, wake slowly, look into his drowsy, half-lidded, golden eyes and _say the words_ at the perfect, perfect moment.

Much to his own surprise, Aziraphale slept. Or at least, he assumed he did, for one never actually _remembered_ falling asleep – it just _happened_. One moment you were lying there thinking pleasant thoughts and the next moment you weren’t thinking anything at all, and somehow time passed and then you were awake, not remembering that you had slept or that you awoke…sleep really was an odd phenomenon.

All he knew was that he must have slept for his usual four or five hours, as there was a faint dawn light creeping through the curtains. He still lay on his back, with Crowley breathing deeply beside him.

Except now those breaths were much closer than before, as Crowley had taken over half of his pillow again, with his head nestled into the crook between Aziraphale's neck and shoulder.

And Crowley had shifted onto his side, facing Aziraphale…and he had flung an arm across Aziraphale’s chest.

He was being _embraced_. 

Enough was enough. No more trembling. No more hesitation – he’d reached the moment at last. 

Aziraphale coughed a little cough. 

_Nothing_.

He tried a louder clearing of his throat followed by a louder cough.

“Mmm?” 

Crowley’s misbehaving arm stretched out full length, fingers splayed, then dropped back onto his chest, where his hand began making light circular motions. He still hadn’t opened his eyes.

This wasn’t quite how it was supposed to go.

“My dear,” Aziraphale said softly, “You are on my pillow.”

“Mmm-hmm.”

“And you are stroking my chest.” Which, he had to admit, felt warm and soothing. 

“Yeah…” Crowley finally opened his eyes, tilting his head up to gaze at him. “You don’t mind.”

“I don’t?” Well, no, of course he didn’t. That wasn’t the point…Aziraphale wondered then, what _was_ the point. He wasn’t uncomfortable. He wasn’t concerned. He certainly _didn’t_ object to this tenderness.

“Nope.” Crowley leaned over to kiss his forehead. “I can see you thinking in there. Stop it.”

“Yes. Right. Sorry.” Why wasn’t the script of his fantasy playing out the way it should? He _wanted_ this closeness. He yearned for it. He had dreamt of it – and then he realized what the trouble was. 

In that perfect fantasy, _he_ was always the one who initiated the contact. Crowley was the aloof one, the swaggering nonchalant fellow who didn’t want to be called _nice_. So _he_ shouldn’t make the first move -- not ever. 

That was an angel’s move to make, to subtly and lovingly win him over. He was supposed to put _his_ arm around Crowley first.

It was all rather provoking. Yet wonderful, too -- this was a caressing embrace that went far beyond a light touch. This was _nice_.

Very, very nice.

Crowley had nestled back into his shoulder, eyes closed again. His hand had stilled.

Well, fine. He hadn’t been given a chance to fulfill his daydream of gently leading a reluctant, hesitant Crowley into a more satisfying, more physical closeness. Obviously that wasn’t necessary. For which he was grateful, of course. However, he was _not_ going to let him say those three special words first. 

Aziraphale coughed a little cough again. 

He heard Crowley let out a long sigh. “Now what?”

“I have something to say.”

“Don’t let me stop you.”

“It’s – well – would you please look at me?” This was special. He wanted to see Crowley’s eyes.

Another sigh. Crowley stretched a little, then raised his head. He gazed into Aziraphale's eyes, with that softest of smiles. “You love me.”

_What?_ “No! I mean, yes! Damnation, _I_ am supposed to say it first!”

The smile got wider. “I love you, too, Angel.”

_Oh, for Heaven’s sake_. “But – but—“

Crowley shut him up by kissing him.

_Oh…Heaven indeed…._

A feathery light touch of the lips… _just_ so…then a stronger touch, and another, and another… _just_ until the tingling warmth spread throughout his entire body, spread out from that one caress, suffusing him with light and fire and something out of a dream.

Then Crowley kissed him again, and again, not just on the mouth but on his cheeks, his nose, his throat…and Aziraphale returned the touch, anywhere he could reach. He returned the embrace, too, turning onto his side to wrap an arm around that slender frame, pulling in tightly.

Better than any daydream by far.

“I was supposed to say it…” he murmured in between his explorations. 

“You haven’t said it,” Crowley replied. 

“I haven’t?” No, actually, he _hadn’t_. “Well, I do. I love you.” He raised his head from where he’d been kissing the top of Crowley’s chest and looked into those golden eyes. “Forever.”

Crowley placed a single kiss on Aziraphale’s forehead. “I can do forever.”

Then he settled back onto the pillow and closed his eyes.

“Are you going to sleep?” 

“Yup.”

“For how long?” It was dawn. Aziraphale had always liked to get up at dawn in the past.

“Don’t know. You don’t have to stay.”

_Oh, yes I do_. “I want to stay.”

“But Angel…I _know_ you. You don’t sleep that much.”

“Not before.” Dawn was possibly an overrated occurrence. “Not when I had to sleep _alone_.” He brushed a hand across Crowley’s forehead, then a quick pass through his hair. “Sleep as long as you like -- I’ll be here.”

“You will, won’t you?” It was more of a statement though, than a question.

“Always, my dear.” 

“Good.” Crowley blew one single breath across Aziraphale’s cheek, kissed the spot once, and then settled into the pillow. 

A soft morning light filtered through the curtains.

Aziraphale steadfastly ignored it.

He had more dreaming to do.


End file.
